Mike DeWolfe : The Daily Edition

Top 5 Reasons Why Public Transit Sucks Your bus can drive away while you're standing at the bus stop. You don't get a refund on your ride even if you're stabbed mid-trip. It's like having a 50 ft. car on the road, with 0+ passengers and one well paid driver; all contributing to traffic density. It moves criminals from the downtown core to suburbs. It's a breeding ground for H1N1. Top 5 Reasons Why Public Transit Rocks Every time the bus pulls over you can get a creepy seat mate! You don't need to drive down Cambie drunk-- get a professional to do it for you. All of the walls of your ride are covered with diploma-mill adverts. There's free gum everywhere! That weird smell probably isn't coming from you.

Today, I hit a video store that was going out out of business. I scored a collection of the best of the early years of SCTV. I got to thinking: there must be some of the these on Youtube. Enjoy! Half Wits High IQ Farm Film Celebrity Blow-up Dr. Tongue's 3D House of Stewardesses Hey Geogry Tim Ishimuri Show Oh That Rusty (from that Martin Short was funny once) Ben Hur (watch out for Leopards!)

First things first: to read this blog post, you will need to pay me $1 in advance . How do you fill a shopping mall? Charge admission. This week, Hillside Mall in Victoria announced a "late night before late nights" event. For $5 per person, shoppers could come into the mall on a Sunday night when the mall is otherwise closed. Stores offered 10% or more off of select items and deals. As of November 23rd through to Christmas, the same mall will be open to 9PM every night. This afternoon, the mall was active but far from capacity. This evening, the mall was thick with people. No parking spots to be had. Line-ups in every store. The mall had carolers, live piano and free bottles of water. Did that fill the mall up to capacity? No: it was the feeling to exclusivity. To have one of the 2100+ cars in the parking lot; or be one of the 6,000+ people crowdng the stores. For $5 you could be packed into a mall that was a 2/3 full when it was free to visit. We're still not out of a r...

Why is it bigotry if a white man hires only white men, but it's solidarity if a union only works with unions?

This from UsedVictoria : H1N1 VACCINE Hello. I am a nurse with an extra vial of the H1N1 vaccine. One vial will do 10 shots. I am willing to administer these shots to the highest bidder. A silent auction will start when this ad is posted and continue until midnight on Friday, November 13. I will contact the highest bidder to arrange to come to their house and administer the vaccine. I will also bring my credentials. Good Luck! What some snake oil? If so, click here

We've all accomplished a great feat. We've made shopping bags as popular as swastikas. Why? Because of our love-hate with oil, we use it all the time and spout vitriol at anyone else who uses it. You've given up bags. Keep the momentum going and give up these other petroleum products: Chewing gum Hair dye Asphalt Crayons (the main ingredient is paraffin wax, a petroleum product also used in most candles) Candles (see above) The wax layer of the packaging your frozen food comes in. (And, of course, the fertilizers that farmers used to grow much of that food.) Ink Panty hose Heart Valves Pillows Aspirin Ammonia Toothpaste Toothbrushes Guitar strings Shoe polish Tape Rubbing Alcohol Vitamin capsules (think you're healthy when you're dosing yourself with a little bit of petroleum every day?) Solvents Caulking Insecticides Deodorant Ask your eco-conscious grocery store when they're going to stop selling the above items.

I have been trying to crack the nut of increased web traffic for some time (my labour pains have been documented on my tech blog ). I may have tripped over a solution, but I have to see if this is a two day fluke or not. In broad strokes, my solution is to ask "what vexes you?" What gets you pissed off and animated? I do this trick in restaurants. I take a moment and tune from my table to all of the tables in earshot. I listen to all of the conversations-- not to eavesdrop: I am taking them in an indistinct combination of words. Family, friends, TV, what's on the menu. What I hear a lot of (maybe because it's me): I hear people talking tech. Why did Windows do this? My email won't work! Did you see the LOLcatz site? I can't get my iPod working! This stuff (tech) vexes people. When it gets people's attention, they look for a way to scratch their itch. Being single vexes single people, so they go to OKCupid (like the slogan says, "your date will be OK...

After some rabble broke up the Torch relay leg in the Cook Street Village area on Friday, one of the spectators who lost her chance to see the torch had the best observations of the weekend: Why are the protestors worried about taxpayer dollars? They're not taxpayers! Awesome! She was very right. This rabble isn't there to get their money spent fairly. They wanted my money-- my tax dollars to pay for them to be able to wander around with piercings and pot smoke on a weekday. But, VanOC wrestled $6 billion from the government-- from MY taxes (and I am totally a taxpayer). I didn't want it: I thought it would be a tremendous blow to our economy. And, I thought it would be an open door to allow in opportunists and corruption. I actually think this is a the raison d'etre of the BC Liberal party. This party of realtors, thugs and criminals don't want to manage a province or bring good government to the people. They want bilk the province, create a massive shift of asset...

Remember: pumpkins do bounce! Happy Halloween!

Lots of hand-wringing going on about rapid transit and how to move people around the CRD. Controlling traffic congestion is like controlling an explosion: you can direct the blast but you can't fine tune it. We need to diffuse the situation. 20,000 office workers are housed in the downtown area. Many of them live outside of the downtown core, some in Langford and Sooke. If 20% were from nearby downtown (walking distance), 20% of them drove cars and 60% bussed; then that means 200 buses full of office workers and approximately 2,000 cars coming into the downtown core daily; and then crushing to get home at night. Do we really need 20,000 people in cubicles downtown opening their email, working on electronic files and chit-chatting around the water cooler? Office workers that directly interface with the public still need to do their work from easily findable offices. The remainder could just as easily work from home or at least work closer to home. With such a volume of people in th...

In influenza: H* stands for the fifth of several known types of the protein hemagglutinin . N* stands for the first of several known types of the protein neuraminidase . H1N1, which caused the 1918 flu pandemic ("Spanish flu") and currently is causing seasonal human flu and the 2009 flu pandemic ("swine flu") H2N2, which caused "Asian flu" H3N2, which caused "Hong Kong flu" and currently causes seasonal human flu H5N1, ("bird flu"), which is noted for having a strain (Asian-linage HPAI H5N1) that kills over half the humans it infects, infecting and killing species that were never known to suffer from influenza viruses before (e.g. cats), being unable to be stopped by culling all involved poultry - some think due to being endemic in wild birds, and causing billions of dollars to be spent in flu pandemic preparation and preventiveness H7N7, which has unusual zoonotic potential and killed one person H1N2, which is currently endemic in hu...

Why is it that some things that need words attached to them don't have that one word attached, like schadenfreude (satisfaction with the suffering of others). For example: Seeing an Ed Wood movie in all of its mediocrity; or seeing a dumpy guy who is in a pathetic pleather trench coat. You'd rather not experience these, you don't look forward to them, but when you encounter them, you enjoy seeing them. How about Schadenfred (for male fashion victims) / Schadenfreida (for female fashion victims)?

Michaels and other retailers are polling you for your postal code. Why? They used to say it was to make sure that you get your flyer. They no longer deliver flyers. They then said they were doing a study. That study must be done-- and besides, when did buying sculpey become a lab experiment? They're trolling for demographics. The same organizations that raise the ramparts and refuse information; and provide poor service. How can you counter this? We all need to provide this postal code, when asked: X0A 2K0 -- X0A is Nuanvut, but 2K0 is not a real suffix. That said, I'm calling a little hamlet called Proteston-- it's a picturesque respite from invasive retailers.

This Saturday, October 24th the Zombie walk caps off with the 1st annual “Little Shop of Horrors” and pre-party for the Zombie Walk at Logan’s Pub, 1821 Cook Street. The market will start at 3pm and vendors can sell until 8:30pm with music to follow. We will be accepting donations at the door during the market. A showcase local artists of all kinds to sell their work from cloths, comics, art pieces, jewelry, leather ware, etc, anything which is Halloween related. I've pondered doing a Halloween day-- make-up, ghost stories, ghoulish events and the like. I thought that 2008 or 2009 would be ideal. Last year passed. This year-- Alisa Shebib and Heather Furneaux organized a craft fair! In the evening there will be performances by Hank and Lily with The Secretaries for their Halloween Tour Kick Off. Joining them local musical performer Dylan Davis. Alisa Shebib will host a Zombie Workshop on stage during the market and other ghoulish surprises to be announced. There's good news if...

I'm planning on embarking on some new art projects this fall. I usually work in clay and polymers; video; and photography. I have some big sculptures. I want to democratize this next part of the process: What should I make? Click Here to take survey

How is it that when you're young, your dream is to get out of retail; then, if you win the lottery your dream is open a shop?

This from the CBC : Members of the Cowichan First Nation on Vancouver Island say the Hudson's Bay Company ripped-off their design for one of the most sought-after pieces of Canada's Olympic uniforms. The First Nation says it bid to knit its traditional sweaters for the Games, but instead the company went with a knock-off. The art of knitting what locals call "the Cowichan sweater" has been handed down from generation to generation, Cowichan elder Jenny Martin told CBC News Wednesday. "My mom taught me how to knit when I was 15 … and my mom had-made sweaters and ponchos," Martin said. Martin said the Bay's version of the sweater has an elk and a maple leaf but lacks authenticity. "It's not Cowichan-made," she said. The local MLA said the situation makes him angry. "VANOC has threatened legal action against businesses that use the Olympic logo or even use the word 'Olympic,'" said the B.C. NDP's Bill Routley. ...

Sunday - The weekend is over. Dread the week to come. Monday - Munday. Hum drum Tuesday - Feels like you should be bowling Wednesday - You're happy that Law & Order is on. But now it isn't Thursday - You're almost there! The shops are open late Friday - Hooray! Mini-graduation Saturday - Anything-can-happen day and it's all better.

Here is a partial list of entertainment types who think that Roman Polanski should escape justice for his 1977 crime of sodomizing a 13 year old child. These are people who have signed a petition. Don't forget to throw Harrison Ford and Johnny Depp into this list of complicit degenerates. Erika Abrams Fatih Akin Yves Alberty Stephane Allagnon Woody Allen - Just LOVES young girls Pedro Almodovar Gianni Amelio Wes Anderson Michel Andrieu Roger Andrieux Jean-Jacques Annaud Frédéric Aranzueque-Arrieta Alexandre Arcady Fanny Ardant Asia Argento - Took on a whole football team for her 10th birthday Marie-Hélène Arnau Darren Aronofsky - Not even his family will watch his movies. Smears jam on his groin on the 1st of every month Olivier Assayas Alexander Astruc Gabriel Auer Zdzicho Augustyniak Alexandre Babel Fausto Nicolás Balbi Eleonor Baldwin Jean-François Balmer Alberto Barbera Museo nazionale de Torino Luc Barnier Christophe Barratier Carmen Bartl Pascal Batigne Anne Baudry Juan An...

Footage of the clean-up of the fire from 1300 block Esquimalt Rd. I was at Saxe Point when this smell of burning plastic wafted over. We followed the sounds of fire trucks and found this scene.

For the last two or three years, I have been seeking a "Tokyo Flash" watch. They are like regular watches (hours, minutes, seconds) but the display is messed up and cryptic. Orderly: but cryptic. That's kind of like the computer code I work with: orderly but cryptic. That made it a natural fit. What was harsh: there were so unknown that they you couldn't find English language sites that featured them. I found some Japanese sites that had them for sale but with the site wholly in Japanese (except the prices), I didn't know what I was getting myself into, so I passed. When I was in Vancouver, I hit a bunch of watch stores in Richmond. This search underlined the cultural divide in Asia between Japan and China. They had no clue what I was talking about: all they had was cases full of gaudy average fare. No signs of the flash watches. I went into a watch shop in town. I asked about these. One of the clerks tried to show me watches that have flash memory. The other one ...

Obama went onto Letterman last night. Obama walks out and says, "What I really came here to see was this heart-shaped potato!" So, this weird little heart shaped potato was tossed up and handed to the president. Great theatre! Barrack Obama has made himself available to 170+ interviews since taking office: three times more than what recent presidents have allowed. Obama has figured it out: we (Canadians, Americans, Chinese-- you name it) are media consumers. We eat it up. By being available for so many interviews he's tapping into the flow. His arena sized town halls are putting him in direct contact with the public. By doing his Flickr feed and Youtube videos, he's bypasing old media and getting to tech savvy people. Over the last few decades, the American Presidency has been hidden and protected to the point where contact is rarefied. It's set up tinder dry conditions-- people starved for access now have access in wildfire proportions. It's a wild change.

People diss the Internet because of how many things aren't what they should be: high bandwidth delivery; real time video communication; or other technologies that are still not there yet. How long do you figure TV took to get off the ground? 1928 : Station W2XBS, RCA's first television station, is established in New York City, creating television's first star, Felix the Cat — the original model of which is featured in Watching TV. Later in the year, the world's first television drama, The Queen's Messenger, is broadcast, using mechanical scanning. Also this year, John Logie Baird transmits images of London to New York via shortwave. 1948 : NBC decided to bring Texaco Star Theater from radio to television, with Milton Berle (Uncle Miltie) as one of the show's four rotating hosts. Television manufacturing begins in Canada. The television audience increases by 4,000 percent this year, due to a jump in the number of cities with television stations and to the fact t...

Sunday morning, we went into the depths of the Red Lion hotel to the Jade Fountain restaurant. The goal was dim sum. Word was this was the Holy Grail of little cart delivered dumplings in Victoria. Expect a review to come soon. What got me was the table sitting behind us (see above). Figure A : Loud A-Hole. He barks out, "Gee we better wash these here chopsticks!" He dipped his sticks into the tea pot and swished them around. Bravo: if the chopsticks were dirty, he just made the tea they were all to drink dirty. Next up, one of the carts came by, piled high with bamboo steamers. The routine is to allow the server describe what it is in each column of steamers. Figure A (aka GWAI LO!-- white eyes) instead started lifting off all of the lids and pawing at the food. Hey animal: that's people food, so hands off! He then started to yell at the waiters and waitresses, literally whistling for attention. He wanted water, so he got up and helped himself to some glasses and a pitch...

Enjoy! The exchange between Churchill and Lady Astor: She said, "If you were my husband I'd give you poison." He said, "If you were my wife, I'd drink it." A member of Parliament to Disraeli: "Sir, you will either die on the gallows or of some unspeakable disease." "That depends, Sir," said Disraeli, "whether I embrace your policies or your mistress." "He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire." - Winston Churchill "I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure." Clarence Darrow "He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary." - William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway). "Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I'll waste no time reading it." - Moses Hadas "I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it." - Mark Twain "He has no enemies, but ...

Summer officially ends on September 21st, but it's effectively over on Labour Day weekend. My Mom's side of the family goes up to Nanoose Bay for the weekend. They hang out and relax. They're a clean-cut bunch and that feels very different from who I am. I used to drink a little, I occasionally have a cigar. I swear like I'm a salesman in Glengarry Glenross. In my off time, I make man-sized sculptures of Cthulhu; and paint up innocent garden ornaments to look like ghouls and 'bikers.' My Dad's side of the family are on the opposite side of the spectrum. Let's just say were they in 19th century England, they would have been shipped to Australia. Here I am: Mr. In-between. I have a belief structure, I like the odd mild vice, I like weird/geeky/dark stuff; but I don't have a criminal record or a string of bad debts and bad situations. Likely, this is why I gravitate to my circle of friends who are much like me: a little geeky, a tiny bit rough, but smar...

Monday night, Victoria's oldest TV station will go dark. Chek-TV has been around for 53 years. It played host to decades of Ida Clarkson. Bruce Kirkpatrick's annoying slice-of-life profiles on cutesy stories. Worst of all: Gordie Tupper (or Tucker-- I don't care). Chek-Around was a show Tupper hosted for some time. How would get on that show? Usually, you'd pay. You'd call them and say you had something interesting to say: if your venture was commercial, they'd hand you a rate card. Pay up and you're interesting. This guy was reknowned for doing only one take: the producer or cameraman would ask to do a second shot or one for safety; confident Tupper would refuse. I was having really mixed feelings about the decline and fall of Chek-TV until last week: they had done a smarmy piece about their efforts to keep the station alive. For the last month, Chek-TV has done a lot of coverage of themselves. They broke from the news and went into ads. Gordie was huckster...

Here is the "latest" FAQ from VIHA: What is the H1N1 flu (Swine Flu)? The H1N1 influenza virus (swine flu) is a virus that causes respiratory disease in pigs. It may also make people sick. Symptoms are similar to the common flu and may include fever, cough, headache, general aches and fatigue. Some people have also reported runny nose, sore throat, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. In BC, patients with H1N1 flu have had symptoms similar to the seasonal flu. How is the H1N1 flu spread? The flu is caused by viruses, and is generally spread when an infected person coughs or sneezes. The virus in the cough/sneeze droplets can be passed to the next person by landing on them or on hard surfaces like counters and doorknobs, where it can be picked up on hands and transmitted to the respiratory system by touching the mouth and/or nose. This is why it is really important to wash your hands frequently. What do I do if I think I am sick with the H1N1 flu? Panic! If you have a fever or coug...

When I was a kid, I watched all sorts of crappy TV. At drama class, the kids talked about how much TV they used to watch in a week: "none", "two hours", "five hours". I sat there, doing math on my chubby fingers and said, "40-50 hours" Everyone's jaws dropped. Well, screw you, you wouldbe mimes and interpretive dance performers! Of the many things that stuck with me was the crappy show, UFO. I used to get gunned when the team would get into their ships by lifting themselves into these tubes shooting themselves feet first into their launch vehicles. It was all a source of excitement: they're getting into tubes, they're going into vehicles-- it was awesome for a six-year old. I was floating home renovation ideas to the Wife. Because we have a peculiar shaped house, we have some odd dimensions to contend with. I suggested that have access from the proposed new workshop into the basement via "one of those launch tubes like in UFO....

I like these, the dialogue/editorial is NSFW, though: 8 Local News Segments Gone Horribly Wrong -- powered by Cracked.com

Back on Earth Day, Thrifty Foods announced it was discontinuing its use of plastic bags. It felt like greenwashing and I was skeptical. Plastic bags are made from petroleum by-products. They don't use oil-- they use the discards from the oil refining process. For the last couple years, plastic bags have been on par with devil worship or kitten juggling. Most people use plastic bags multiple times. While they are demonizing bags, SUVs are causing masses of pollution. All of the work re-road to accommodate traffic crippling and bicycles consumes massive amounts of asphalt made with (you guessed it), petroleum products. But let's pick on the plastic bags. Thrifty's began selling durable plastic bags for less than $1 per. While the hated plastic bags occupy almost no volume and will eventually breakdown into general filth, these durable bags are built to last. Once they get into the landfill, they're going to be there, dotting the rubbish for years. A few weeks ago, Thrifty...

Photoshoot photo Originally uploaded by dewolfe0001 We went to friend's birthday party on this secluded beach in Gordon Head. It was nice and it was hard to get to. We noticed a couple of people tinkering with photographic equipment. Later the guy set-up more elaborate equipment and the girl stripped down to a bikini. He started to take photos despite the number of families in our cluster. A short time later, a couple of surfer types showed up to skid around in the shallow waters. I thought, "Hey-- they shooting the cover for a porn video." I had other ideas that went through my head: "that guy doesn't have any film!" and "Geez-- I can't believe I got a girl to take her clothes off!" and "golly-- I thought no one would show up here," Twenty minutes later, a bunch of party monkeys showed up to drink and smoke up. One of them stripped off his top and and mugged for a photo with the girl in the bikini. Poor photographer dude: he totally ...

Science World hit its pinnacle after the National Social ist Credit Party (aka the Liberal prequel) spawned Expo 86. Since then, the quaint 1980s interactive science exhibit has aged. Many of the exhibits are broken or non-functional. Now the Telus World of Science has become very expensive and largely run by volunteers of varying capacities. One of those volunteers humiliated a woman who was breastfeeding her child while her other child was playing in one of the functional exhibits. In response to the conduct of the volunteer (who is getting paid what he is worth), Science World has rewritten its orientation policy for volunteer staff members. The volunteer told her that breastfeeding her newborn baby on site was "immoral." I love the idea of calling breastfeeding immoral. I'm sure this spastic either feels dirty when he pees; or feels shame at what his mother laughingly called his "nub." The irony of this incident is still to come: breastfeeding activists a...

Last night I was at the Tim Horton's in Esquimalt. All Tim Horton's are refuges of the damned: deep fried dough, black bile that a double-double can never fix, and some of the stupidest people alive behind the till. No? I can't how many times I ordered a tea with sugar only to receive a double-double coffee. Little Esquimalt has two Timmy's: Little Timmy's: where drug addicts shoot up, so they have to lock the bathrooms and close early. Big Timmy's: where people go to sober up after the Carlton Club. The local hero is a Doug: a pimp who recruits girls from the popular smoking side of the donut shop. My friend loves Timmy's coffee. I think it's swill. While I continue to go there to allow him to get his coffee, we now depart and go to Serious Coffee or settle for a Starbucks so that I can get coffee. Last night we did this and travelled around town. Later, my friend wanted another Timmy's. We went back to the Sarlac pit in Esquimalt. I bought my frie...

min_and_max Originally uploaded by triviaqueen I like using them to sell my miracle "Diet-Ray": I put Minnie in a box. Then I huckster to the yokels. I heft Max around and say that with my Diet-Ray I can restore his youth and lower his weight. Then I put him in the box with Minne, turn on the Diet-Ray and lift out Minnie to the amazement of the crowds.

What I find is wild is Stephen J. Gould's idea that evolution is like a battlefield: long periods of boredom followed by periods of panic and action. Just 75,000 years ago, homo sapien's breeding pool was knocked down to 1,000 to 10,000 people. This created a genetic bottleneck. Also, all of the race's came from diversification after this event. More interesting: some of the pre-cursor species (H. ergaster, H. erectus, and possibly H. floresiensis., etc.) could have existed upto this time. If the Toba Catastrophe happened just 75,000 years ago, that's really recent. It underlines that evolution is fluid and it can flow fast. With the current environmental stresses, we could be entering into an evolutionary bloom of new species (or die off of the unviable-- I'm looking at your, Mr. Tibetan Suicide Monkey). My inner geek thinks about the BSG idea of reducing a population to very few survivors. Or the Lord of the Rings idea that Middle Earth existed in our far past. Or...

This from IO9.com : ( Edit , to draft , Top , Slurp ) Copy this whole post to another site Slurp cancel select site advertising consumerist deadspin defamer fleshbot gay fleshbot gawker gizmodo idolator io9 jalopnik jezebel kotaku lifehacker valleywag artists gawkershop I'm still waiting for the day when humans navigate cities by being sucked through pneumatic tubes. But in the meantime, New Zealand's bicycle- monorail mash-up, known as the Shweeb, might be the next best thing. The Shweeb is a human-powered transit system that employs a recumbent cycle to move a clear passenger tube along a rail. Currently, the only operating Shweeb is located Agroventures Adventure Park in Rotura, New Zealand, where for $45, you and your friends can engage in Shweeb racing. But the inventors ...

A collection of ads from Europe. Combine non-English with cleverness and voila! NSFW ads on European TV: